Cost of living is squeezing UK house prices

House prices rose only 2.6 per cent in 2017, according to Nationwide, a leading mortgage lender, compared with London’s first fall in eight years.
Growth was 4.5 per cent in 2016, the slowest annual rate since 2012, as households with declining real wages are increasingly reluctant to make big spending decisions.
Nationally, the country says economic growth is slowing, household financial pressures are rising and prices could slow further to around 1-1.5 percent in 2018.The average house price in December was 211,156, up 0.6 percent.
House prices in London fell 0.5 per cent last year, the worst performance since 2004, as more buyers were unable to buy in the capital.
The country’s chief economist Robert Gardner (Robert Gardner) said: “in London and the south-east, affordability becomes more challenging, more and more people are forced to withdraw from the market, or you need to borrow more income.
Mr Gardner said it would take nearly a decade to buy a house in London, with an average price of 470,922 at the end of last year.
Prices have risen across the UK except London in 2017. The biggest increase was in the west midlands, where average prices rose 5.2 percent to 182,861 pounds. Southwest was second with a 4.8 percent increase to 239,576 pounds.
The country said low mortgage rates, high employment and a housing shortage had led to a slowdown in UK house growth in 2017.
Lenders said the outlook for the housing market over the next year was uncertain and highly dependent on the outcome of brexit negotiations and the overall economic performance of the UK.
“The performance of the real estate market in 2018 depends largely on the overall economic development. “The development of brexit is still important, although it’s still hard to predict,” Gardner said.
“There have been significant regional price differentials in the UK housing market in recent years and it is not clear how brexit will affect these changes.”

Ernst & young item club forecasting group’s chief economic adviser, said Howard Archer (Howard Archer) in 2018 the real estate market will be “very challenging” year, part of the reason is that after the bank of England increase interest buyers fear that there may be a higher mortgage costs is November for the first time in ten years, and said it could rise further.
“Housing market activity is still being squeezed by consumer purchasing power, fragile confidence and cautious pressure to participate in big deals,” archer said. “Potential buyers may also be worried about further rate increases after November 2011. We expect prices to rise slightly by 2 per cent in 2018.
Household finances have been under new pressure since the brexit vote, causing the value of the pound to plummet, pushing up the price of overseas imports.That, in turn, has driven up inflation, now at 3.1 per cent, well above the 2 per cent target in England and above the current 2.3 per cent rise in wages, which implies a fall in real wages.
According to the mortgage advisory board, the property market is likely to be similar to that of 2017, with first-time buyers, particularly in London, struggling to rent. Regional differentiation is expected to continue this year, with prices rising faster in some areas than in others over the next 12 months.
Nationally, changes in affordability have increased over the past decade. Wales, Scotland and northern England region’s economic applicability improved, but in Northern Ireland after house prices fell sharply, the improvement of the economic crisis has been the biggest, before the financial crisis, the proportion is about 40% lower than in 2007.
Prices in London, however, are 55 per cent higher than in 2007, while those in the north, Yorkshire and humberside are still lower than in 2007.
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Alex Gosling, founder of HouseSimple.com, an online real estate brokerage, said the 2.6 per cent rise in UK house prices in 2017 showed that the property market was “basically in a very healthy state”.
He added: “with the brexit vote and article 50 being cited, the property market has proved remarkably resilient in 2017.
“The main surprise is undoubtedly the slowdown in house prices in London. Thirteen years have passed since the nation’s capital bottomed, and since then we have seen prices soar to unprecedented levels. “